This Social Studies resource page is intended to assist State Operated Programs’ teachers and education staff find quality resources and lesson ideas on the web. The following links and documents have been provided to meet the needs of the specific population and classroom environments found within Virginia’s State Operated Programs’ education centers.

Note: If you do not have a “Google” or Gmail account, please, make an investment in establishing an account for educational purposes. A number of great applications and software are available for teachers for free with a gmail/google sign in. Also, a benefit of having a separate account from a division-wide account is establishing a camaraderie among the State Operated Program community.

http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/“A ringside seat to history…” is the tag to the website. Pictures, quotes, and voices…from Prehistory to the 20th Century, history seen through the eyes who lived it.

http://www.loc.gov/teachers/tps/The Library of Congress offers digital resources to America’s classrooms to enhance the need of using primary resources for compelling historical arguments. The library includes perspectives in wildlife, folk life, the Veteran’s perspective, and through poetry.

Constitution http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/tocs/toc.html The Founder’s Constitution (1986). Offers a perspective through 19th century documents, retrospectives of both 18th and 19th century philosophers and advocates, it is considered a ‘valuable aid’ in understanding our nation.

http://www.mrdowling.com A multitude of resources dedicated to World Studies—from Prehistory to some Modern Era (World Wars) topics. His worksheets generally have Cloze passages based on the readings and higher-level thinking questions to answer.

http://www.civiced.org/Center for Civic Education. A resource/organization dedicated to Civics education and the importance of teaching the Constitution of the United States in our nation’s classrooms.

http://nearpod.com/: Interesting application for student learning by combining slides, multimedia tools, assessment items in real time and integrating technology. Comparable to all software platforms. It is also word of mouth too, by the way. The more friends you suggest through email, the more upgrades earned (nnpselizabeth5@gmail.com).

dropbox.com Elizabeth McGrath is a huge fan of Dropbox. It is a lifesaver! It is a cloud storage for documents, photos, etc. Dropbox subscribers are offered 2 gigabytes of space for a free account. By word of mouth (mention my email—elizabeth.mcgrath@nn.k12.va.us), both you and the reference receive additional space. I have 52.8 GB!

drive.google.com Google Drive. Personally, I am learning more about using Google Drive, but it is a very useful resource, especially for collaborative purposes. It is also cloud storage based, good for files and collaboration. Imagine Tidewater teachers collaborating with a Southwestern VA teacher one afternoon at the same time over a lesson plan simultaneously? It can happen!

BrainPOP http://educators.brainpop.com/about/ If you are fortunate to have this service, use it! A school subscription is approximately $1700! Brain Pop has a vast collection of topics, from social studies to math. There are questions, vocabulary words, even assessments based on the films.

Flocabulary: A number of educators have raved about the program! Flocabulary is an online library of educational hip-hop songs and videos for grades K-12. Unfortunately, it is a paid site and costly if a classroom teacher invests in the program. https://www.flocabulary.com/what-is-flocabulary/

http://beyondthebubble.stanford.edu/ Calling itself “The new generation of historical assessments,” the website coordinates sources from both the Library of Congress and “Historical Thinking Matters” from Stanford University’s History Education Group (SHEG) for students to apply history in action.

https://quizlet.com/ There is an option: free and a paid account. Elizabeth McGrath has an account (MrsMcGrath23607). I personally like this site to create word wall vocabulary, quizzes, even little pocket vocabulary and definitions.

YouTube Videos

Crash Course History Series with John and Hank Green. LOVE this guy, he is so energetic, knows his stuff and he does it for World I, World II, and VUS. I also like that he has closed captioning. From Astronomy to World History, the two cover a lot of material! https://www.youtube.com/user/crashcourse